Anyone who was in any way connected to the substantial grapevine of gossip that permeated through all of Seireitei had heard at least twice the juicy (yet completely unfounded) rumor that best friends Madarame Ikkaku and Ayasegawa Yumichika of the Eleventh Division had met each other in a Rukongai whorehouse.

The rumor ended there, but those who heard it were quick to fill in the omitted details. As such, the colorful, lengthy story of how Ikkaku had brazenly purchased the finest whore in the establishment only to unpleasantly discover later that the stunningly beautiful young woman he had bought was, in fact, a just as stunningly beautiful young man was well-circulated enough to be considered fact. Most Shinigami were unbothered by the fact that the rumor was unsubstantiated by evidence, but then again, Abarai Renji - the latest new recruit into Zaraki's division of thugs - had never really considered himself to be like most other Shinigami.

One day, when he'd gotten himself drunk enough to do it without fear of retribution from either of the two involved parties, Renji asked Ikkaku in person if the rumor was true. (He would have asked Yumichika, too, for the record, but Renji had enough street smarts to know that you didn't just voluntarily go asking for trouble from someone exuding that much demonic gay charm. Such a thing, he knew instinctively, would be tantamount to suicide.)

Either way, he hadn't been expecting Ikkaku's unabashed, matter-of-fact confirmation that it was true.

Renji was taken aback, and his perception of the world and its workings was shaken severely enough for him to need to order another several drinks. He'd suspected that Yumichika had swung that way, but Ikkaku? He couldn't believe it at first, but with the consumption of more and more alcohol and upon closer inspection...

Upon closer inspection, it explained quite a lot of things - things like the red eyeshadow, for starters.

Afterwards, Ikkaku suffered through three long days of annoyingly knowing glances from the redhead before he chucked an inkwell at the bastard out of sheer frustration. He couldn't for the life of him understand what the hell had been wrong with Abarai since they'd gone out to grab a drink after work over the weekend. Deciding that enough was enough, Ikkaku walked over to the man - who was still staring at him strangely despite having been at it for hours already! - grabbed him by the collar, dragged him outside, and proceeded to thoroughly and enjoyably beat the reason out of him.

That day, he discovered one important thing about Renji:

The man was an idiot.

It took a special kind of idiot, Ikkaku decided, to hear "Yea, we met at a whorehouse" and immediately translate it to "Yea, we had sex". He'd claimed no such thing, ever. But on second thought, considering the knowing looks complete strangers kept on shooting him and Yumi, it looked like Renji wasn't the only special kind of idiot in Soul Society. In fact, Ikkaku realized, they were everywhere - multiplying, growing, /breeding/.

He decided that day that this special type of idiot was just as bad - if not worse - than a really bad infestation of Hollow rats.

Ikkaku sighed. If only they knew the truth. The fateful day that he had first met Yumichika, he hadn't even been a customer at that whorehouse.

He'd been a bouncer.

And Yumi had just really, really, really needed to use their bathroom.

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Disclaimer: Any and all characters from Bleach are the legal property of Kubo Tite.